MCCE partners with Langley convenience stores to offer healthy snacks

Customers at Rod Langley’s four convenience stores in Marengo County may notice a new display of fresh fruits next to the checkout counter.

Or, when looking for something to snack on, they may see a section of the store’s shelves with a sign designating the merchandise as “Good Choice” foods.

It’s all part of a new initiative spearheaded by the Marengo County Cooperative Extension Service, and it’s leading the way in Alabama.

Representatives from the state Department of Public Health and Extension Service were on hand Thursday at Langley’s Shell Station in Linden to kick off officially the start of the program.

“We are really excited about this healthy food initiative,” said Tammy Glass, Nutrition Education Program (NEP) agent with the county’s Extension office in Linden.

“Rod Langley has been incredibly helpful as our partner to bring healthy food access to Marengo County,” she continued.

Langley had a personal reason for taking part.

“I had to start losing weight myself,” he said. When he decided he had to eat healthier, he took a look at his store shelves and discovered there was “nothing here to eat.”

About a month after that Glass called to see if he would become a part of the Good Choice Healthy Food Initiative, and he quickly got on board.

Although Marengo County is not the first in the state to start the program – two convenience stores in Washington County began a month ago – it is on the cusp of the drive to get Alabamians to make better choices when snacking.

The idea is “to make some simple environmental changes where people have access to healthier foods,” said Dr. Barb Struempler, professor of Nutrition, Dietetics and Hospitality Management at Auburn University and program leader for the Extension nutrition program.

“It’s just making the healthier choice the easier choice.”

The initiative is an effort to give small, rural communities access to healthy foods, added Glass.

To get set up, the Alabama Department of Public Health provided the Good Choice signs, colorful t-shirts and ice barrels to keep fruit boxes fresh at all four of Langley’s stores. The Alabama Extension Service provided the baskets to hold fruit.

And it seems to be working. The barrels and baskets of fruit are located at what Langley calls the “hotspot” in the store next to the checkout counter. The staff at the Linden store said the choice of fresh fruit had proven popular on the first day of sales.

Healthy single-serving snacks are displayed along four feet of four shelves. They are chosen by the “10-10-5” criteria, Struempler explained. Each one must have less than 10 percent recommended daily allowance of fat and carbohydrates and at least 5 percent of any of the following: calcium, fiber, Vitamin B, iron or potassium.

The Good Choice program began several years ago by the state DPH in vending machines. This new program is expanding the initial push to change how residents choose to snack.

“It’s really cool to think that this is one of the first efforts in this state where they’ve taken ownership to help the health of their citizens,” said Struempler. “I’m impressed, I really am.”

Such a program is found nowhere else in the southeast, although other parts of the country offer such choices to their customers, she continued.

The initiative is part of an ongoing effort to try to “change a culture” in a state with such a high percentage of obesity, she said. Marengo County is estimated to have 40 percent of its population overweight.

“Being fat causes a lot of problems,” Struempler said, and those problems aren’t just physical such as heart disease and diabetes. Those who are overweight often have low self-esteem, and overweight students can be the victims of bullying.

What the Extension office, ADPH and Langley have started is eligible for the Community Partnership Award by the National Extension Association of Family and Consumer Sciences. They will find out in March if they have won state recognition. The national award is made in July.

Good Choice displays also are in Langley’s other two Shell stations in Demopolis and Thomaston and at his Texaco station in Providence.